What Version of Windows for Gaming?

[nines]

I'm a bit lost there. The thing I know so far is that I will get a 32-bit OEM version but there are... a lot!

Meanwhile some people think that Vista would be fine for gaming by now but honestly I don't really care much for DX10 until it's defenitely a minimum requirement. Whatever, even if I would get a version of Vista - would the Home Basic stinkingness be 'enough' for gaming or will this already require the Home Premium dubiety? Same question with XP - is 'Home' enough for gaming AND will it work with Bootcamp or do I need XP Professional?

Thanks in advance.

EDIT: The Rig is a Macbook Pro 2.4GHz|8600m GT 256MB

 

[flopticalcube]

I'm a bit lost there. The thing I know so far is that I will get a 32-bit OEM version but there are... a lot!

Meanwhile some people think that Vista would be fine for gaming by now but honestly I don't really care much for DX10 until it's defenitely a minimum requirement. Whatever, even if I would get a version of Vista - would the Home Basic stinkingness be 'enough' for gaming or will this already require the Home Premium dubiety? Same question with XP - is 'Home' enough for gaming AND will it work with Bootcamp or do I need XP Professional?

Thanks in advance.

EDIT: The Rig is a Macbook Pro 2.4GHz|8600m GT 256MB

XP Pro gives you nothing more in gaming terms than Home. XP is due for one more service pack, possibly getting DX10. Most games I have seen seem to run better in XP under DX9.

 

[Eidorian]

I'd go with XP Home.

Vista Home Basic would be enough for gaming. You would be getting DirectX 10 support.

 

[nines]

Woah! Thanks for the quick replies, this happened in lightspeed!!

Cool, so the decision on getting XP Windows is concrete. What would be benefits of Pro actually?

 

[Eidorian]

Woah! Thanks for the quick replies, this happened in lightspeed!!

Cool, so the decision on getting XP Windows is concrete. What would be benefits of Pro actually?

Dual socket support, Windows domain access, Remote Desktop, etc...

 

[jamesi]

benefits to win xp pro is that its not the home edition. seriously, home edition is too unstalbe for me so i stuck with pro. vista would be worth it but all your games will run slower on the same hardware. vista is worth it after about a year or so, the same as when xp first came to the scene.

 

[jamesi]

XP Pro gives you nothing more in gaming terms than Home. XP is due for one more service pack, possibly getting DX10. Most games I have seen seem to run better in XP under DX9.

yea but i doubt microsoft will bring DX10 to XP, thats one of their big points to get ppl to upgrade right now. well, the gaming enthusiast anyways

 

[flopticalcube]

benefits to win xp pro is that its not the home edition. seriously, home edition is too unstalbe for me so i stuck with pro. vista would be worth it but all your games will run slower on the same hardware. vista is worth it after about a year or so, the same as when xp first came to the scene.

I have noticed no difference in stability between Pro and Home. After SP2 both are fairly stable.

 

[nines]

Too bad Bootcamp won't work with a Windows XP Pro SP1 because I'd have one of these leftover from a dead PC. Wasting money always feels bad. Sorry for the ******** if weird smileys by the way, I'm feeling incredibly relieved after I finally ordered that MBP and escaped from this 'waiting for the next update' vicious circle!

 

[hankolerd]

I'm running Vista business, because I could get it from my school for $5. I honestly haven't had any problems with it yet. If your computer is good enough to run it, and you have a way to get a cheap copy, or the money to get the expensive copy, I would suggest it. Once you get it you can turn off the Aero effects, and turn off all the annoying pop-ups asking you if programs can run. There are alot of people that complain about Vista over Xp, and I am not that much of a windows person(I only boot in for gaming) So i don't really know what the downfalls are. It seems to work fine for what I use it for. The fact that you will be able to install DX10 is pretty cool too, because we all know eventually you are going to want it. Though, there are people working on porting it to XP, so by the time you want it you will probably be able to get it for XP. Well that's just my 2¢.

 

[1ncr3du10u5]

Too bad Bootcamp won't work with a Windows XP Pro SP1 because I'd have one of these leftover from a dead PC. Wasting money always feels bad. Sorry for the ******** if weird smileys by the way, I'm feeling incredibly relieved after I finally ordered that MBP and escaped from this 'waiting for the next update' vicious circle!

You can install SP1 and just update it to SP2 surely? Granted it will take hours of updating and restarting but it's better than stumping up the cash!

 

[Consultant]

Too bad Bootcamp won't work with a Windows XP Pro SP1 because I'd have one of these leftover from a dead PC. Wasting money always feels bad. Sorry for the ******** if weird smileys by the way, I'm feeling incredibly relieved after I finally ordered that MBP and escaped from this 'waiting for the next update' vicious circle!

You can

a. see if you can purchase an upgrade disk of XP SP2 from MS. I am pretty sure they have a program for updating the disk.

b. download / borrow a copy of SP2 but use your license / reg key from the dead computer

 

[Consultant]

I'm running Vista business, because I could get it from my school for $5. I honestly haven't had any problems with it yet. If your computer is good enough to run it, and you have a way to get a cheap copy, or the money to get the expensive copy, I would suggest it. Once you get it you can turn off the Aero effects, and turn off all the annoying pop-ups asking you if programs can run. There are alot of people that complain about Vista over Xp, and I am not that much of a windows person(I only boot in for gaming) So i don't really know what the downfalls are. It seems to work fine for what I use it for. The fact that you will be able to install DX10 is pretty cool too, because we all know eventually you are going to want it. Though, there are people working on porting it to XP, so by the time you want it you will probably be able to get it for XP. Well that's just my 2¢.

Well, if you just boot into windows for games, you spend maybe just minutes in windoze before you boot up your games, it's different then trying to use it for productive means (especially if you can multi-task different apps, documents using keyboard and mouse at the same time).

When I just bootcamp into windoze for games I don't get annoyed that much. Well, maybe at the fact that a 2 month old clean windoze install with legit everything (anti-virus, anti-spyware installed). is now taking way longer than OS X to boot up on the same machine.

 

[mahashel]

Gaming? Windows XP.
Pro or Home. Doesn't matter, as far as gaming is concerned.

Vista might someday see some "optimization" patches that offset the performance hit, but for now Vista is *miserable* for gaming. (compared to XP)
DX10 is a wild card, but I wouldn't worry about it. If you eventually find that you can't live without DX10, then in the future you can simply buy a cheap OEM copy of Vista and upgrade. For now, just reuse your XPsp1 key (it should install SP2) and game on!

 

[hankolerd]

Well, if you just boot into windows for games, you spend maybe just minutes in windoze before you boot up your games, it's different then trying to use it for productive means (especially if you can multi-task different apps, documents using keyboard and mouse at the same time).

That was kinda my point, I don't do anything productive in Windows, because OSX makes it so much easier to be productive. The only reason I have found to have windows is for gaming.

 

[nines]

Thanks a lot for the many replies!

I eventually tried to get a new cd but the XP Pro I had obviously was an OEM version and they don't hand out new cds if you have one of those. There is a a way to forge the servicpacks and the old SP1 cd together to a SP2 bootable cd but I'm seriously beyond fumbling around with that crap, this annoys the hell out of me. I remember the time when twelve 'My Files' windows popped up after booting... I spent quite a few nights grubbing around in the registry to fix this because a fresh install was no option for me that time.
Brrrr!!!

Where I'm currently at I could get a XP Home for almost the same price like a Vista Home Premium - even more questionably: The Vista Home Basic costs more then the Premium.

Now after reading hankolerd's post, I'm convinced that Vista would be fine too but on a MBP 15GB for a Microsoft OS feels a lot like being really mean to the poor computer. At the same time it's quite a blow into the balls for a 160GB HDD to waste so much space for actual poo and I don't want to lose the warranty otherwhise I'd pop a bigger HDD into the MBP. Ah, well...

 

[tominated]

Unless you want to play vista only games (like halo 2), get XP home. Don't forget that Microsoft is going to hassle game devs to make vista only games to get people to upgrade!

 

[hankolerd]

Unless you want to play vista only games (like halo 2), get XP home. Don't forget that Microsoft is going to hassle game devs to make vista only games to get people to upgrade!

don't forget also that it is only a matter of time before microsoft stops offering system updates and bug fixes to xp users, to get people to upgrade.

 

[nines]

Bwah... aight, then I get the Vista Home Premium 32-bit OEM. There goes my precius harddisk space... 15GB!!!

Anyways, how will this look like for gameplay finally. The games I'm going to play will be Oblivion, Neverwinter Nights 2 (Windows version because of the toolset) and Lord of the Rings Online. Looking forward to Age of Conan in March. Maybe I will try out Quake Wars also but the older I get the slower I become in shooters. My Golden Age ended with Quake II, heh.

My system is a MBP 15.4'', 2.4GHz stock model.

 

[Consultant]

Vista has a LOT of overhead, which means most games will run slower on Vista than XP.

Almost forgot, you can use your existing XP cd to make a XP SP2 CD.
google this: "slipstream sp2 xp"

Not sure whether it'll be accepted as a real SP2 disk though, but it's worth a shot instead of paying more for something less functional when you already have a license.

 

[luffx]

Bwah... aight, then I get the Vista Home Premium 32-bit OEM. There goes my precius harddisk space... 15GB!!!

Anyways, how will this look like for gameplay finally. The games I'm going to play will be Oblivion, Neverwinter Nights 2 (Windows version because of the toolset) and Lord of the Rings Online. Looking forward to Age of Conan in March. Maybe I will try out Quake Wars also but the older I get the slower I become in shooters. My Golden Age ended with Quake II, heh.

My system is a MBP 15.4'', 2.4GHz stock model.

We seem to have the same game interest. I will be buying a 20" IMac this week and dualboot Vista Business. I plan on playing the same games. Can't wait for Age of Conan. I hope I can run them @ decent settings. ::shakes fist::

Let me know how those games run for you. ^.^

~Luf.

 

[Dustman]

Bwah... aight, then I get the Vista Home Premium 32-bit OEM. There goes my precius harddisk space... 15GB!!!

Anyways, how will this look like for gameplay finally. The games I'm going to play will be Oblivion, Neverwinter Nights 2 (Windows version because of the toolset) and Lord of the Rings Online. Looking forward to Age of Conan in March. Maybe I will try out Quake Wars also but the older I get the slower I become in shooters. My Golden Age ended with Quake II, heh.

My system is a MBP 15.4'', 2.4GHz stock model.

Turning off Aero (or even setting the UI to Classic Mode) will make your game performance a little more comparable to XP's. Vista's going to be slower though until the operating system matures a little bit and drivers get better.

 

[ivnj]

In my opinion vista is more stable.

 

[ravenvii]

You can install SP1 and just update it to SP2 surely? Granted it will take hours of updating and restarting but it's better than stumping up the cash!

No you can't.

However, you're not SOL. You can take that SP1 disk and make a new install disc with SP2 slipstreamed (Google it). You can use that install disc with Boot Camp no problem.

 

[recoman3]

I possibly have the same computer as yours. I have erased most of the windows junk it came with and only loaded it up with games and a few chatting programs (skype etc for when playing games w/ friends). It runs sweet if you ask me. I have all those desktop widgets turned off, AVG free as my virus protection (I doubt I'm gonna catch a virus through UT3).. And all runs very well. Now I don't have first hand experience with xp so I'm not gonna comment, but like one of microsofts ads I saw the other day "change is inevitable", so vista would be my recommendation..

PLUS, i heard that vista SP1 is coming first quarter '08 (Source: gizmodo) and apparently its much much faster.. and that bit of news was what pushed me over from xp to vista.

I don't know what form of vista is best, just bought the cheap one with less features..